Jennifer Weiner's stories all tend
to focus on similar themes: overweight women in their twenties with skinny
sisters, women writers thinking about marriage, or young mothers dealing with distant
husbands, living in New York or Philadelphia. Her most appealing character is
Nicky, a funny and annoying sister who appears in the first two stories, which
read like chapters from a longer novel. Their parents are separated and the
two girls, who are both in college, visit their aunt. Weiner (pronounced
"Wyner") admits that her stories, which were mostly written earlier
in her writing career, have a strong autobiographical element. Weiner
certainly gives the feeling that she knows her characters well, and she writes
with a brisk cheerful prose that entertains. At the same time, she does not
shy away from women's discontent about their bodies, their relationships, and
their careers. The Guy Not Taken fits well in the "Chick Lit"
genre defined byBridget Jones'
Diary, with its focus on the funny side of neurotic worry, but Weiner
shows a powerful ability to capture the concerns of American college-educated
career women.

The audiobook contains selected
unabridged stories from the hardcover version, on 6 CDs. They are performed by
Mary Catherine Garrison and Jordan Bridges. Garrison does a great job, getting
lots of character into the different voices, reading the stories very
sympathetically.

Christian
Perring, Ph.D., is Academic Chair of the Arts & Humanities
Division and Chair of the Philosophy Department at Dowling College, Long Island. He is also editor of Metapsychology Online Reviews. His main
research is on philosophical issues in medicine, psychiatry and psychology.

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